Postal service -- United States -- Second-class matter
Now some readers may wonder why I so particularly present the work
done by this commission for their consideration at this point in my
discussion of the general subject we have under consideration. In view
of my previous statement, to the effect that I do not agree with some of
the conclusions of this “Penrose-Overstreet Commission” some reader may
wonder why I make reference to it at all. Well, there are several reasons
why I do so and do it just at this point in the consideration of our
general subject. Among those reasons are, briefly stated, the following:
The inquiry and investigation of this commission were broad,
comprehensive and thorough.
Its report presents many arguments, recommendations and conclusions which
must appeal to any man who is fairly well informed as to our federal
postal service, as sound and sensible, however widely he may differ from
the commission’s conclusions on some other points covered in its report.
Some readers who have seen and read the Penrose-Overstreet Commission’s
report may possibly have concluded that it presents _all_ the information
collected and collated by the commission. The reader so concluding would,
almost necessarily, think the information it presents insufficient, both
in subject matter and in detail, to be as helpful to the Postmaster
General as, on a previous page, I have asserted the work of this
commission would be to Mr. Hitchcock, or would have been had he taken the
trouble to consult the voluminous but carefully collated data gathered by
the 1906-7 commission and on file in his department.
I will here quote a few lines from the report of the Penrose-Overstreet
Commission in proof of the fact that its inquiry, investigations and
work provided Postmaster General Hitchcock, had he but taken the time to
consult it, a store of information vastly greater than that presented in
its brief official report of sixty-three pages.
Read the following and you will readily understand why Representative
Moon, on March 3, 1911, so strenuously objected to the appointment
of another second-class mail commission and to spending $50,000 more
of the people’s money to investigate a matter already thoroughly and
comprehensively investigated and to collect and collate data _which is
already on file in the Postoffice Department_. The quotation is from page
6 of the commission’s report. The italics are the writer’s:
In accordance with this plan, (outlined in immediately preceding
paragraphs), which operated to economize the time as well of the
commission as of those appearing before it, _a great volume of
evidence was presented upon all aspects of the question_ from the
standpoint _both of the postal service and of the publications
involved_
…
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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